I can finally spill the beans! I’m heading to California next Friday for the annual conference of Les Dames d’Escoffier, the international culinary organization formed in honor of the French chef Auguste Escoffier.
About a month ago, I received a phone call from one of the members telling me I had won the MFK Fisher Award for Excellence in Culinary Writing, an award that the group gives every two years. I assumed it was a joke, and there was a back-and-forth of "No!" "Yes" "No?" (If you’ve read the work of my fellow nominees Jane Black of the Washington Post and Susan Change of the Boston Globe and NPR, you’ll know why I was unconvinced.) However, the woman persisted, so I’m hopping on a plane next Friday for Palm Springs.
MFK Fisher is my all-time, food-writing heroine… no one comes close to her sensuous, lively prose. Auden called her the best prose writer of her time, without qualification or reference to food. If you’ve never read her work, start with The Art of Eating. Do you have a favorite MFK Fisher book or quote?
Cheers,
Natalie
